


burn your bridges

by unholyconfessions (orphan_account)



Series: remember the secrets we've told [1]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Barry is Jealous of Eddie, Eddie is Jealous of Barry, F/M, Friendship/Love, Implied/Referenced Cheating, Infidelity, Light Angst, M/M, Making Out, Post 1.06 - The Flash Is Born, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-19
Updated: 2014-11-19
Packaged: 2018-02-26 06:50:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2642198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/unholyconfessions
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Barry doesn’t get why he’s often—always, really—included in that scenario, but he is. Eddie seems to appreciate their time together, even though he mostly talks about unsolvable cases at work, which only serves to get him angrier. Sometimes, he delves into the subject of Iris, and Barry almost feels sorry for the punching bag.</p>
            </blockquote>





	burn your bridges

**Author's Note:**

> I could not resist the amount of awesome between Barry and Eddie this episode. Is this a brand new ship or what?! C'mon, people. Does it have a name yet? Let's do this! 
> 
> This is unbeta'd, so excuse any mistakes. Feedback is always appreciated.
> 
> Enjoy.

Barry isn’t opposed to working out.

He really isn’t (especially when he has to fight other metahumans that are far stronger than him in an almost weekly basis) but he finds himself having to eat enough dinner for three people whenever Eddie invites him to “blow off some steam.”

Barry doesn’t get why he’s often—always, really—included in that scenario, but he is. Eddie seems to appreciate their time together, even though he mostly talks about unsolvable cases at work, which only serves to get him angrier. Sometimes, he delves into the subject of Iris, and Barry almost feels sorry for the punching bag.

“I’m glad you and Iris made up,” Eddie says, one day, as Barry is holding the bag in place for him.

One, two, three punches and the intensity of it travels through the bag and right into Barry’s cheek. Barry blinks, lightheaded, and holds the bag away from his face for a moment. Eddie’s arms fall to his side as he watches Barry struggle for an answer.

“Yeah, me too,” is what he comes up with, and smiles.

Eddie smiles back, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. His gaze makes Barry feel naked.

“You’re a good friend, Allen.”

Somehow, that doesn’t sound like a compliment to Barry’s ears.

***

There is a certain lack of extraordinary cases in the following week.

Still, Iris comes to Barry with a piece about the Flash and asks him if there’ve been any strange occurrences in a case lately, ones that haven’t been broadcast by the media. Barry helps her as best as he can without revealing himself, but given the circumstances, there isn’t much he can offer her.

She nods at whatever small bit of information he gives her, typing away at her laptop. There’s a glimmer in her eyes now, a purpose that hadn’t been there in a while, and Barry wants to, needs to, encourage that. He has given up trying to steer her away from it. 

The next day, the Flash saves an old lady from getting run over by a truck. Iris makes a post about it and Barry smiles to himself when it pops up on his phone.

***

Barry is starting to think that all metahumans in Central City have been locked up in a secret base somewhere when he gets a call from Joe telling him to haul his ass to a crime scene downtown.

Eddie is crouching next to a body, surrounded by shards of glass and blood, when Barry gets there. He gives Barry a small acknowledgement over his shoulder before Joe pulls Barry to a secluded corner.

“A witness said that a man pushed the victim through the window,” Joe says, and Barry glances back at the body to confirm it, “and then flew away.”

That last bit takes a while longer to process. Barry scratches the side of his neck, asks, “He _flew_ away? Like, with wings?”

“No. Not with wings, Barry.”

“Oh, so he _floated_ away. Got it,” Barry says, nodding. Joe looks like he might fire him at any instant. Barry gestures in the body’s general direction, mutters, “I’ll just, you know,” and proceeds to start collecting evidence before he finds himself out of a job.

He finds it impossible to focus with Eddie hovering over him like a curious five-year-old. So, when Eddie asks him what he thinks happened, he has no adequate answer except, “This guy definitely fell out a window.”

Eddie gives him a puzzled look and Barry shrugs, excuses himself to where Joe is talking to another witness. 

“There’s nothing for me to do here,” Barry tells him once they’re alone. 

Joe sighs, nodding at nothing in particular, and waves at him, “Go do your thing.”

Barry doesn’t need to be told twice.

***

They close the case with a single casualty—a result from a bullet straight out of Eddie’s gun as he saved Barry, in full Flash uniform, from taking an unsolicited dive off a building.

At the end of the day, Iris comes down to the station looking like she ran a marathon. She touches Barry’s arm as she asks him if Eddie’s alright, and Barry bites down onto his tongue to keep from telling her that he was the one in danger, not her boyfriend.

The heat lingers on his skin even after she runs off to wrap her arms around Eddie, Eddie’s face nestled on the curve of her neck. Barry watches, silently, and only notices that Eddie’s hands are shaking against Iris’ back when Eddie glances up and their eyes meet.

Barry nods at him, gives him a small smile, and Eddie’s eyebrows knit together before he presses his face to Iris’ neck again.

Sometimes Barry forgets that, if he falls, he’ll mend back together, but other people won’t.

***

“Hey, Allen,” Eddie calls out, and Barry turns around in time to see him nodding toward the stairs.

Barry doesn’t know how they got to this stage, the one where Eddie barely has to say a word for Barry to know that they’re going to head upstairs and throw some punches around. It’s become a constant in his life, along with late-night talks with Iris about the Flash.

He hesitates for a moment, opening his mouth to tell Eddie that he’s got some work to do first, but Eddie just shakes his head, smiling.

“You can do that later,” Eddie says, shrugging his suit jacket off. He nods to the side again. “C’mon.”

Barry lets out a resigned sigh, but doesn’t fight the smile that spreads itself on his lips as he follows Eddie upstairs. Eddie pats him on the back once Barry’s caught up with him, and Barry looks up at him to find a question dancing in his eyes.

“What?” Barry says, stops mid-step, hand around Eddie’s wrist.

Eddie is one step above, his back to Barry, and he doesn’t turn until Barry gives his wrist a little squeeze.

“Iris is obsessed with the Flash,” he announces, without warning, and Barry catches himself before he can fall on his ass. Eddie glances around before adding, lightly, “She’s obsessed with _you_ and she doesn’t even know it.”

Barry searches for the right words to say, but Eddie’s gaze makes his brain stop functioning for a moment. Instead, he lets go of Eddie and pinches the bridge of his nose, staring at a small spot of coffee on Eddie’s shirt.

“I’m sorry,” says Barry, eventually, because that’s the only thing he can think of. 

He’s been indulging Iris’ hobby not for her, but for himself. He loves seeing the way she seems full of hope whenever the words _the Flash_ come out of her mouth; he loves how enthusiastic she sounds when she calls him in the middle of the night with a new idea for the blog; he loves _her_ , and he loves seeing her happy.

But Eddie—Barry knows he loves her too. Barry can see it in his eyes; in the way his face will brighten up whenever Iris drops by the station unannounced, or in the way his gaze will fill up with terror whenever a guy like Tony Woodward gets her in danger.

“Eddie—”

“C’mon, Allen,” Eddie speaks over him, patting his arm. The touch lingers on Barry’s skin, much like Iris’. “You gotta work on your speed, remember?”

Eddie laughs. Barry beats him to the punching bag.

***

Barry is leaving the station after a long and tiring case when Eddie’s voice calls for him. He turns around, forensic kit in hand, to find Eddie jogging over in his direction.

“Show me.”

He puts his kit down on the ground, smiling past a frown. “Show you what?”

Eddie’s panting when he says, gesturing with a finger, “Your thing. I want to see.”

Barry tries to fight the heat creeping up his cheeks, but his ultra-fast metabolism does nothing to help. Eddie makes a strange sound in his chest when he realizes what he’s just said. He clears his throat.

“Your speed,” he amends, looking like he might punch Barry if Barry so much as considers laughing, but there’s a hint of a smile there.

In a tenth of a second, Barry shouts from the station’s roof, “Show me yours and I’ll show you mine.”

Eddie barely has time to look up before Barry is back down to the parking lot. He smiles and Eddie smiles back, reaching up to touch Barry’s shoulder with a finger, as if to see if he’s real. Barry glances down at the finger poking him and back up to find something else in Eddie’s eyes, and it’s not jealousy, doubt, or surprise.

This isn’t like Joe when he first saw what Barry could do; this is like Iris and Felicity. It’s fascination. It’s an attraction to something amazing, to something beyond comprehension, the inexplicable. Every bit of enthusiasm Barry sees in Iris when it comes to the Flash, he sees in Eddie right now.

But Eddie, unlike Iris, is seeing right through the mask. Eddie, unlike Iris, is trailing his hands over the expanse of the Flash’s shoulders and arms, studying, analyzing, scrutinizing every muscle under the skin. 

Barry feels like an art piece, and it’s not a bad feeling. He just wishes he could give Iris the opportunity—just like he’s giving Eddie—to touch him and see him for who he is, to see the amazing things that he can do without him having to hide behind a blur.

And when Eddie moves closer, his chest bumping against Barry’s, Barry wishes he could give Iris the chance to feel the Flash’s mouth on hers, slow and steady, exploring. He wishes he could grab the back of her neck and pull her closer, taste the excitement on her tongue, leave her hot and dizzy and wanting more.

The reality, when they break apart and Eddie’s eyes are dark and expectant, is that Barry can’t do that for her. If the way Eddie’s forehead falls to Barry’s shoulder, defeated, is anything to go by, he doesn’t think he can do that for her either.

_

end

_


End file.
